click here please!
Reefs die every day as we go about our daily lives, oblivious. Time is not something we can recycle, no matter how far science progresses.
Let's start saving them today.
Play your part!
Well, I'm sure everyone who has seen this blog would have gotten the message the we have to save the Earth by now. But the question is: How? There are lots of ways we can help out. Even simple things that we do in our daily lives count.
1. NEVER litter in the water
2. Don't waste water
3. Reuse, Reduce & Recycle
4. Instead of accumulating so much rubbish, make them into new, useful stuff
5. Reduce the use of that car!
6. Take public transport more often
7. Don't buy stuff that you won't need and will probably end up throwing them away
8. Start spreading the message
9. Save electricity!
10. STOP GLOBAL WARMING!!!
If some people can do it, why not the rest of us? Do the right thing today!
Friday, September 5, 2008
posted by Anki M at
click here please!
The Green Team 094
This is The Green Team 094, a group of 12-year olds, ready to do our part to save the Earth.
Earlier this year, 2008, we joined a competition called "Learn@1ºN", a competition based on
climate change. After the competition, we were motivated to do more to stop global warming, so we started
The Green Team 094 and a blog
called
Mission: Save the Earth!, where we spread the word about climate change and the increasing danger of global warming.
So you may be wondering, why the name "Green Team
094"? No, it's not because there were teams 1 to 93. We were team 094 in Learn@1ºN, and it's a really special name for us because it was the first time we were working together to stop Global Warming. When we were making our blog,
Mission: Save the Earth!, we thought of the name "The Green Team" for ourselves, and then we realized that 094 just stuck to it. It was a natural thing.
Samantha N: I'm Samantha Rachel N, but I'll stick with my first name unlike Rachel here. I am a person who likes to think a little deeply sometimes, so don't mind my saying that I believe that I have to do something in this life, here.
I hope that that something is to do with saving the Earth, something I'm passionate about. I also hope that more people would listen to what we, children, the future inhabitants and protectors of this planet we call home, would like to say.
I'm normally not really into technology and everything to do with computers, and was clueless about it before Learn@1ºN and making the 'Save The Earth' blog.
But if I can help my home planet with technology, then I'd spend the whole day telling everybody across this planet that I love my home and believe we can do something for Earth.
(and don't mind - I'm the most long-winded amongst The Green Team 094, I believe. If you see a post far too long, it means the others haven't started nagging me to shorten it yet!)
Rachel K: Hiya everyone! I'm Melissa Rachel K, but you can just call me Rachel. I'm an art-drama-and-music-loving, chocolate-obsessed tree-hugger
(look at all the hyphens). I may be the smallest person in the group, but I also have the biggest voice. I guess you could say that I'm sentimental; everything has its value to me: family, friends, special memories, love, especially the Earth, animals, plants, and coral reefs. When I grow up, I'm going to earn money for charity and animal shelters, provide relief for poverty and do public talks all
over the world to spread the word about climate change and teach others to save our only home. I've only got one thing to say to you: If you don't care about the Earth, then that's your problem. But we, as the children of Earth, would actually like to do something, and if you don't want us to fight for our own future, then you're making a big mistake. Please take that to heart, and help us to get the future we deserve. Besides, you got it. Why can't we?
Ankita M: Hi everyone! Yes, my name is Ankita Mukherji. Unlike my two team members, I have no middle name, so no confusion involved. Short and sweet. :D. I am a girl who love the Arts and Saving the Earth. Theatre. Dance. Music. Visual Arts. All these things rock my life. I feel like I've been put on this Earth to help people and play my part for the environment. When I grow up, I want to help poor people by putting up shows and raising money for them. Though part of that money would go to environmental stuff. I also want to help all the animals(Have I mentioned I love animals? All of them. I'm crazy about animals!!!)One thing is for sure: I LOVE FOOD!!! Especially chocolate, ice cream, pasta, pizza, ah forget it! I love all that junk! I hope I'll be able to persuade more people to help the Green Team 094 to save the Earth!
What we've said...
Previous Posts
Note: I know this may be a bit confusing for some people so I'm explaining it carefully.
Due to the nature of navigation blogskins, clicking on an archive link will not bring you immediately to the post. Once you click on a link above, the page will be refreshed, bringing you back to home. Simply click on "Let's Save the Reefs!" on the navigation bar
and you will see the posts. To view other posts, just go back to
http://reef-dilemma.blogspot.com (click here!) and go to "The Green Team 094" to see the archives or "Let's Save the Reefs!" to just see the other posts. Thanks!
click here please!
Why conserve?
Let's step into an illusion here. Imagine yourself 50 years into the future. The world is empty. The surface is scorched and burnt. Scraps of ash litter the ground. Where there was once water, there are large bodies of rubbish.
All that was left of life is now decomposed and lying in piles of death. Buildings have collapsed to the ground and mangled wrecks of metal that were once cars are now destroyed to no repair. Millions of papers and wood and rubbish litter the surface of the once vibrant, beautiful planet which was bursting with life and hope.
50 years is not that far away. Do you want that to happen?
All this could happen soon, and it would be all our fault. Global Warming is the result of our irresponsible actions. Believe it or not, in one way or another, you have caused death. When you flipped that switch, when you took the car, when you when you threw away that perfectly good, recyclable piece of paper, did you know the consequences? Of course not. But now that you do, will you stop?
Consider what will happen to the Earth if we DON'T stop. What will happen to the polar bears in the arctic? What will happen to the forests all over the world?
What will happen to you?
If you need reasons to conserve, I'll give you this: DEATH.
Yes, we'll die eventually, but we are digging our own graves. Accelerating death. Killing our lovely planet. Our deaths will occur sooner. We will have less time to live.
We've worked so hard to get our planet where it is now. We've developed the world into Paradise. We don't want to lose that. Giving this up without a fight would be illogical and worse, not faithful to the Mother who raised all of us living beings from the smallest living cells.
So if you think this can be left alone, think again.
Reasons, reasons, reasons
Just about everybody knows that we should all work together to save the Earth, save the reefs, stop global warming, etc. (I mean, I'm so sick of hearing that too, even though I know that it's true)
These words have been repeated for such a long time, everybody's gotten sick and tired of hearing them and don't take them seriously enough to heed them.
We're here to help explain things clearly once and for all.
So if you really need a reason why you should save the reefs, pick just one from the list we've provided for you below, focus on that and play your part, so you can steel yourself to do or not do that one little kind, sacrificing act to help save the reefs.
1. When reefs bleach too often, they die. Yes, they do grow back when the pressure that caused them to bleach is taken off them, but it takes a very, very long time and besides, the original coral formations that were an intrinsic part of nature's underwater world is lost forever. It'd never be the same again.
2. There's actually fluorescent protein in some corals, which give off a glow. This fluorescent protein may actually help researchers to find a cure for AIDS and cancer. (And everybody knows what a great help that would be!) Find out more info about this fluorescent protein at:
(this website)
3. Many people will be out of a job if the corals do go completely extinct (touch wood, please don't let that happen!) Corals support the tourism, seafood, and seaside housing industries. Without coral reefs, slowly but surely the world's economy would start to fail.
"Corals are some of the most endangered organisms on the Earth. There are thousands of different kinds of coral, and many are headed for near extinction," said Vincent Pieribone, an associate professor of cellular and molecular physiology and neurobiology at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut.
So play your part today.
Human Nature
It's part of our nature to take things for granted - unless, of course, any person in question has never experienced anything good before. Anyway, for the average human, in such a high-tech society where everything is made to be done at the touch of a button, everyone's had their share of comfort/luxury, no matter how small.
I've realized that we only begin to notice things we had at first when they're gone - sometimes forever, too. It hurts to know something you'd never cherished is gone forever and then you'll regret that you never got a taste of what it was like.
The same goes for the reefs, under the sea so deep, almost nobody cherishes them and cares for them.
Are you going to wait till the reefs go 'extinct' before you finally realize their beauty and majesty? Yes, you can't put a price on them, yes, you can't sell them. You can't gain anything from looking at them other than that sense of awe at seeing one of Mother Nature's greatest creations.
Reefs are priceless. Save them.
The GPGP
No, not a sci-fi story gone wrong! It actually exists, and the only reason you don't normally notice it is that it's in.. yes, you've guessed it - The Pacific Ocean. It's actually a huge collection of irresponsibly-disposed plastic stuff, otherwise known as Plastic Soup, that makes a death trap for all marine animals.
Because all the plastic garbage we dispose of every day, ends up there and is killing marine life every day. They mistake it for food and eat it. (plastic never biodegrades totally - just keeps getting smaller till it's a speck, and even that can be consumed by animals living under the waves.
Visit: (this website) for more info. The founder of it, David de Rothschild, is an adventurer and ecologist, and his website consists loads of games for kids, though you can play them if you like, even if you're an adult, and learn loads more!
Plastic soup has already been mentioned, but we wanted to post this website too! Don't mind if we nag a little!
click here please!
What you do say?
Please feel free to comment and suggest!
NOTE: Please do not post explicit, vulgar or irrelevant comments. This is a place to tell us and others how you feel about saving coral reefs, not to spam. Thanks!
Shoutmix chat widget ;)
click here please!
"I did NOT kill the reefs!"
Are you sure about that? Are you so sure that you havn't harmed the coral reefs in the slightest way? Well then, think again.
All that rubbish we throw out everyday... All that litter... Don't we ever think twice before harming the environment like that? Do we? Have we ever cared to think that all the wastes we produce go into the ocean, killing the fish and the reefs?
Pollution. Deforestation. Burning of fossil fuels. Greenhouse gases. Amount of Carbon dioxide increasing. All that added together = Global Warming.
So what exactly did Global Warming do?
Human actions (e.g. Deforestation, carbon emissions) → More Greenhouse gases → Greenhouse effect a.k.a. Global Warming → Atmospheric & Ocean temperature rising → Bleached corals → Disaster and DEATH
So as you sit in front of this computer screen, thinking that you need to get out of here, the earth and the corals are dying.
Just because the reefs are not something you notice everyday doesn't mean they don't exist and you should ignore them completely!
When will humans realize that there is more to the Earth than themselves? When will we stop thinking of only ourselves?
"If we don't do something for the Earth, who will? The Aliens?" - Megan Chong
Many things could happen in one minute:
1. A billion people on Earth throw out the trash
2. Carbon dioxide is emitted.
3. Heat is trapped all over the world
4. Sea temperatures rise by 1ºC.
5. Another coral reef dies.
6. Millions of lives are lost.
Many things can happen in a minute. They are happening now as you read. They will keep happening.
The thing is: They can be stopped. But are we really trying to stop them?
Let's face the facts. The reefs are dying. It's not too late to help out, but soon, it might be.
We have to play our part. Think again. Do NOT kill the reefs!
click here please!
What dilemma?
40 years into the past, and you find yourself scuba-diving in the Great Barrier Reef. Vibrant schools of fish surround you, swimming past you in crystal-clear waters. Colourful corals dominate this underwater paradise, and everywhere you look, there's life bursting around you. Now hang on for a moment. Everything seems so perfect, right?
Not for long.
Fast forward 40 years. Feel the water warm up around you. Watch as the algae that once kept the corals alive now move to better life conditions, leaving the corals to die on their own. Because that's the way nature goes. One organism dead is better than two. Watch as the once-so-alive coral reefs communities turn to nothing before your very eyes. See the reefs die one by one, leaving nothing but colourless, brittle rocks.
This could happen. This
IS happening. Coral reefs are bleached just as I am typing this. Just as you are reading this.
Global warming is taking over the world. It's taking away all the beauty of the world. It's causing natural disasters to occur more often. It's killing the wildlife, the nature, the animals, and the homes.
Worse, it's taking away our coral reefs.
Because of global warming, sea temperatures are rising rapidly.
"High seas surface temperature (SSTs) coupled with high irradiance (light intensity), triggers the loss of zooxanthellae, a symbiotic algae, and its dinoflagellate pigmentation in corals causing coral bleaching. Zooxanthellae provide 95% of the energy to the coral host."
-Quoted from Wikipedia
So what's happening to the corals? Exactly what's plaguing every single one of us, now as I speak: Global Warming.
The corals are dying. Please hear their pleas for help, and answer them.
Fishing methods
Some fishermen use fishing methods that destroy the reefs. Trawling (dragging heavy nets across the seabed) is one example. And, to make matters worse, recent trawling nets actually are more advances and can 'hop' over low rocks, so more areas can be trawled.
Trawling is super-destructive, but the damage is normally hidden from view, one of the reasons why many people do not realize the importance of saving the reefs, conserving for them, and basically protecting part of our home.
